Always in my mind
by Maj-Clementine
Summary: Because sharing your life makes it so much better. The difficult part is to learn how to share, and how to get there. Future Literati
1. The first day of the rest of her life

A/N: This is my first Lit fic. It may be cliché, but it has its exceptional things just out of my twisted mind.

Dedication: To my lovely beta, Rave, I love you girl, you are just wonderful! To my girlfriends Lena (just because I found you) and Sassy (because we share our Milo love). And Heather my 2nd Beta.

Pairing: Literati

Spoilers: everything on the show until now, before season 5, happened; and a couple of things in Season 5...

Rating: R (just to free my imagination) but PG for now...

Disclaimer: I just can't own anything! I'm too far away from hollywood!

Feedback: yes please, let me tell you what do you think!

Summary: Because sharing your life makes it so much better. The difficult part is to learn how to share, and how to get there.

**Always in my mind**

Chapter 1.- The first day of the rest of her life:

Rory was graduating from Yale, her dream was so close to be true. She had landed a job as Junior writer at The Times, in New York. She felt proud. After four long years, of studying and writing, projects and extracurricular activities, she was finally starting to live her dream to become a journalist at first... a foreign correspondent in time. She was achieving one of her big goals in life, she was making it happen. What she always wanted, what she worked so hard for was at palm reach. Her life was hers.

The graduation ceremony was emotional but wonderful. Everybody who cared for her was there, her mom, Luke, her grandparents, Lane with Zack, Sookie, Jackson and their kids, her dad, and close to every single inhabitant of Stars Hollow.

She felt happy, complete, though in the back of her mind, she knew something was missing. Love, a companion, her Luke. Someone to share this big accomplishment with. Of course her mom was there, and she was proud. Lorelai was one of the big reasons of this diploma.

But Rory wanted more, in fact she always wanted more. When she had Dean, she wanted Jess, because Jess could challenge her, because she could shared most of her passions with him. Because Jess felt like a wake up call from the small town life with the boy next door boyfriend. Then, she wanted Dean back. He was secure, he loved her, and wouldn't leave her. Because, after Jess broke her heart by leaving without even saying goodbye, and then coming back just to leave again, and coming back again demanding her to give up her life for him when he never did anything for her, when he never was there for her. She wanted security, stability back, but it was a mistake, Dean was a mistake, Dean wasn't hers anymore, he was married. Their relationship wasn't pure and virginal anymore... it was tainted. She thought she wanted Logan next, it was a thrill just arguing with him, he was new and exciting and seemed not to want her. Logan was a conqueror, a challenge for her... but then it got boring.

She had yet to find one that had it all: the thrill, the intellect, the love, the caring and the bad boy attitude in one package. Today, at her graduation ceremony, she felt incomplete without it all, she wanted it all, she was determined to get it all, the whole package just like Lorelai did. Love in Luke, a family in Rory and the Gilmores in its twisted but loving and caring kind of way, and the job of her dreams in the Inn, friendship in Sookie and a home in Stars Hollow.

A week after Graduation, Rory was moving to New York, she was starting her new job the following week. Her grandparents, as a graduation present and because her grandma liked big gestures, gave her a two bedroom appartment in the city. The choice between accepting and not accepting it was a no-brainer Lorelai said, for two reasons, because Emily Gilmore would never take no for an answer and because, the apartment was gorgeous! It was spacious, full of light, with a beautiful balcony and a wonderful view of Central Park. It was far out of a junior writer's league but she fell in love with it almost inmediately so she took it. Between her mom and grandma, they decorated it with style but personality. The spare room became her study and library. And her room was white with wooden furniture. Clean and Simple. The living and dining room was spacious and had a big couch with her entertaining center from Yale, and a dining area. The kitchen was full of colours and the only three appliances were her cofee machine, the refrigerator and the microwave. She didn't know how to use anything else.

Moving day was hectic, Lane and Zack, Luke, her mom and her grandparents made a trip to the city to help her. Hundreds of books to place in the bookcases. Hundreds of boxes with everything that belonged to Rory, memories, notes from Chilton, Yale. The appartment was chaos, full of people helping, having fun and enjoying being there for Rory in this new stage of her life. Lane and Zack were in charge of music arrangements, and organizing Rory's CD collection. Lorelai beeing Lorelai leaving traces of her style everywhere, a monkey lamp in the studio, a hello kitty alarm clock in Rory's bedroom, and an entire Cosmo magazine collection in the coffe table. This made Emily furious and ended in a bickering battle between the two older Gilmore girls about style and manners. Richard was reading the paper as usual after helping Rory to organize her bookcase, and Luke decided to fix what didn't need to be fixed in the kitchen just to disappear but Rory stayed in the leaving room watching her mom and grandma argue and bicker about everything, because she was going to miss this.

After unpacking and settling everything the Gilmores, Luke and Lorelai, Lane and Zack left Rory alone to adapt in her own space. Her first appartment. Independence in walls and windows.

So Rory was alone for the first time in her life, because even at Yale she had Paris as a roommate, her suitemates, her friends. But she felt good and excited about this new experience. In New York everything was new and exciting, everything was hers to be discovered. So she decided to go out to explore her neighbourhood. To conquer the city. Besides she was getting hungry and she had nothing in her refrigerator and none take out menu yet.


	2. Common Ground

A/N: This is my first Lit fic. It may be cliché, but it has its exceptional things just out of my twisted mind.

Dedication: To my lovely beta, Rave, I love you girl, you are just wonderful! To my girlfriends Lena (just because I found you) and Sassy (because we share our Milo love). And Heather my 2nd Beta.

Pairing: Literati

Spoilers: everything on the show until now, before season 5, happened; and a couple of things in Season 5...

Rating: R (just to free my imagination) but PG for now...

Disclaimer: I just can't own anything! I'm too far away from hollywood!

Feedback: yes please, let me tell you what do you think!

Summary: Because sharing your life makes it so much better. The difficult part is to learn how to share, and how to get there.

**Always in my mind**

Chapert 2.- Common Ground

She was walking around when she noticed a lovely looking place, "Dodger's Cafe - Books and Coffee." It was in a corner, painted Irish dark green with big windows. From the outside it seemed quiet and peaceful.

Rory immediately felt intrigued by it. So she went inside. The atmosphere was incredible, it smelled like coffee beans and old books, humid pages, vintage ink and lightly smoky. Hard cover first edition books decorated all the walls in beautiful dark wood bookshelves and little wooden tables with comfy couches invited one to stay for hours and enjoy. The music choice was vintage rock music, strong, hard but not loudly played. She felt at home right away, and couldn't wait to bring Lorelai over some day when she came to visit her. She took a seat at one of the tables by a window, to see people walk by the street. The couch was comfortable, and soft, just like a couch should be, for you to stay in it and enjoy a big cup of coffee and a big thick book.

Immediately after she positioned herself in her table, a young girl, came and introduce herself as Jenny, her waitress. She was in her early twenties. She was thin and bubbly, with green eyes and short light brown hair. She seemed nice and smart. She definitely gave her a pretty good first impression, Rory thought while Jenny explained the "mechanisms" of the Café to her. She gave her a book, recommendation of the month, to read but not to take home, she pointed, the book was _The Unbearable Lightness of Being_ by Milan Kundera. Rory had never heard about it, but Jenny said that it was a great love story, with angst and happiness just like life. And after that she gave her the menu.

The menu was a piece of art on its own. It appeared to be a book, an old used hard cover book. When you opened it you found the name of the cafe as the title, Dodger as the author and inside you had lots of coffee and eating options. Rory felt attracted to the idea, she was falling in love more and more with this place as she lived through what Jenny called the "Dodger's Coffee Experience".

Rory felt weird about some options though, she felt like she knew some things, or that she got the why's of the names. Rory didn't know what to order, she was debating between the "_G-Force_" Coffee option because it said "_only for Java Addicted, black, industrial strength_", or the"_R-way, her way, the right way, strong, full of body and aroma._" She stuck with the R-way, it seemed her kind of coffee, and indeed it was, it looked like the owner of this place knew her, knew everything about her. Food options had book names: Man and the sea, was a sea food salad, Oliver twist, was a Mediterranean green salad with olives and lemon dressing, food to go was called On the Road food. The menu was full of lyrics to Distillers songs and other Rock Bands songs, like The Clash...

But still looking at the menu, she started to get suspicious, "_Dodger's drink – stolen beers_" was something she could related to, or the notes in the margin of the book, or in the menu, or maybe it was the food options, or the "_Look Healthy food, not your choice_".

Or maybe it was that this was _HIS_ city. She had never received any news of him in the past years, after that night at her dorm, when she said **NO!** To him and broke both of their hearts. She knew Luke talked to him from time to time, and came to visit sometimes, but she couldn't bring herself to ask about him, to talk to Luke or Lorelai about him. But she wanted to know, but never dared to search for him, to contact him.

And now she suddenly felt like she was back in his life, he was invading her thoughts, like she couldn't stop thinking how much he would love this place. It was a vivid reflection of what she knew about him. But that was years ago, maybe he was a completely different person now. Or maybe he wasn't even in the City anymore. Jess was a free spirit, that she knew for sure, so she guessed he was travelling around the world, living like Kerouac, or Hemingway, a life full of experiences and passions.


	3. On my own

A/N: This is my first Lit fic. It may be cliché, but it has its exceptional things just out of my twisted mind.

Dedication: To my lovely beta, Rave, I love you girl, you are just wonderful! To my girlfriends Lena (just because I found you) and Sassy (because we share our Milo love). And Heather my 2nd Beta.

Pairing: Literati

Spoilers: everything on the show until now, before season 5, happened; and a couple of things in Season 5...

Rating: R (just to free my imagination) but PG for now...

Disclaimer: I just can't own anything! I'm too far away from hollywood!

Feedback: yes please, let me tell you what do you think!

Summary: Because sharing your life makes it so much better. The difficult part is to learn how to share, and how to get there.

**Always in my mind**

Chapter 3.- On my own

Every time he wakes up, he likes to admire his life. The changes, the years that passed. His life. Not his mother, not his father, not his uncle, not Hers or anybody else, His. After his experience in Stars Hollow, and Venice beach, he came back to New York. He needed to take a grip, and gain his life back.

Away from his mom, who shipped him to Little-no-where-ville, because she couldn't deal with him. Because he couldn't deal with her, with the broken family. Away from his dad, and his new family, because he left them and forgave himself and allowed himself to start over. Away from Luke, who had to much faith in him, and it broke his heart to let him down.

He didn't know who he was anymore. Who was Jess Mariano, screw up? Genius misunderstood? Youth and rebel? All of the above? Well he was back in the city to understand all his life, to let go of the grudge, and the angry Jess. He wanted to be someone, to have his life in his own hands, and not be influenced by others mistakes and life experience. He wanted to live on his own, by his own rules and to experience his own experiences and make his own mistakes. Ok his dad left him, his problem, his mom shipped him, her thing, and Luke believed in him? Rory believed in him? Maybe there is something to believe in to. So he decided to explore the possibility of success.

And here he was, a published author, a critic for The Rolling Stone, and an owner of a coffee shop, his project, his dream place, just his, his achievement, on his own, by his own merits.

How he got here? Well, because he worked hard, and started believing in himself, and because of her. When he came back to the city after Venice Beach, he landed a job as a delivery boy, lived in a dump with some guys, he worked hard and studied to get his GED. Then he decided he wanted more, not because he had to, but because he wanted. He loved to read, he was voracious for reading material, so he signed up for some classes at NYU, literature and writing. There he met John Scott, an english teacher, and he became his tutor. Encouraging him to write and express himself and put his anger and life experiences in paper. And it became his therapy, his life saviour. Writing was cathartic, inspirational, the more he wrote the more he wanted to write, the more ideas he got. After emptying lots of notebooks, he bought a computer, an ibook, and adapted himself to 21st century. The entries of his diary became short stories and then a novel.

The novel was just an experiment, or a project maybe, to put all his life in a book, all his experiences in an idea. He wanted to put all his anger in the past so he thought a book was a good way, it was closure. And after two years of working on it, while attending classes, now looking for a degree in writing and working part time in an old used books store, it was finished and ready to see the world.

He showed it to his mentor, who loved it, and recommended to him to send it to a couple of publishers and arranged him an interview with his own. With the years, John and Jess became friends. Jess trusted John with his life, projects and dreams. In fact he trusted himself, and allowed himself to dream and make projects, to think of the future.

On the side, John got Jess a job as a freelance writer for The Rolling Stone Magazine, nothing big but it was a great opportunity for him. He had full creativity. He wrote a column reviewing CDs, books, movies, as a New York insider. This helped him with his music and book collection, got him into clubs, concerts and restaurants. But above all, got him more economic independence, so he got a place on his own, just a small studio in the village, near the bookstore, nothing fancy but his first bachelor pad.

After a lot of come and go, corrections and rewriting, publishing his style he became a published author. His book about misunderstood youth, about failure, dreams, faith and life itself became a best seller right away. At the same time, the owner of the bookstore where he worked decided to retire and sell his business. Jess who loved that place decided to buy it with his book money and transform it in Dodger's Bookstore. Irony played tricks with him, because the bookstore had an apartment above it, and Jess decided to move there, with an infinite amount of jokes on Luke's behalf.

And a year after that, this was his life, and he was very proud of it, enjoying every second of it. The bookstore, the magazine, working on his new book, his degree in creative writing. With no regrets but one. Her. But he thought that all his experiences made him the man he was today, so maybe it wasn't a regret, but a what if, an unfinished business, a nostalgic memory.


	4. Old Habits Die Hard

**Always in my mind**

Chapter 3.- Old Habits Die hard

She was not a morning person, she was a Gilmore, and Gilmores, well Stars Hollow Gilmores weren't, because she could bet her grand parents were morning birds, but well, she as her mother, was not, but out of habits, nasty Chilton, and Yale habits she became a as her mother call it, an "on the week" morning person, so she was at this beautiful café everyday at 7 in the morning for breakfast, she felt like her mom used to feel at Luke's, at home. For the past couple months since living in the city, this place, Dodger's Café was her morning home; she in fact became friends with Jenny. And loved reading every recommendation this mysterious owner had for her. She has yet to meet him, Jenny always said they will get along really good, because he was a book worm as Rory was, but with a cooler exterior, almost a Bad Boy, may "reformed" and mature. And Rory every time she heard this thought immediately to a boy she once knew who know might be a man.

Jess was not a morning person, never was, in fact he was an owl, he loved nights, city lights and quiet streets. He used to walk aimlessly around town when he lived in Stars Hollow, enjoying the quiet taylorless time in the night but always missing the city. And now back in the city he loved sitting in the fire escape of his apartment to smoke a cigarette and enjoy the city. So that is why he was never up before noon, he did everything better during the night, write, think, work, read, and miss her…

That is why both of them didn't know how close they were to each other, until tonight. Tonight Rory stayed late at the office finishing an article she had for the next morning and she was really hungry when she stopped at the café for a late snack, she guess Jenny would be gone, but she thought it was a good time as any to meet the infamous dodger, the café owner, and introduce herself as her number one big fan. Oh boy, was she wrong, after sitting at her table, and waiting for someone to wait on her she saw him, and was immediately frozen by his own surprised face expression. Both couldn't believe what they saw, but in the back of her mind, Rory was realizing everything, connecting all the dots, seeing all the details, confirming her suspicious, she thought she was crazy every time those thoughts crossed her mind, she always said, oh come on Gilmore you're being paranoid, or to hopeful, or to lonely.

In fact she was lonely, after all this time living in the city, Rory was as her mother used to say, all work and no fun! She worked her ass off to become someone at her job, and had zero social life, weekends were spent in Stars Hollow, to visit the town and her family. In fact lately she started to feel the loneliness, the incompleteness, when Lane announced her marriage and Lorelai her pregnancy, and she felt lonely, really lonely this time. All the feeling of void she felt after graduation were back, full force.

And here she was staring at him, thinking how he might compete her, when he approached her:

-"Hi, is nice seeing you again, how are you doing?"

She couldn't answer, here she was, speechless, thinking how could he talk to her like nothing happened between them, as they were old friends from high school.

-"Rory?" he said to get her attention… waving a hand in front of her lost eyes

-" Mmmm, Hi, Jess, this is a surprise…" was her timid response

-"That it is, you want some coffee, or something to eat?" he said trying to break the tension

-" Coffee of course, you know you don't have to ask, or you have lost your memory?" she said trying by herself too to have a normal conversation with him…

-"Well on that thought I should bring you the pot a two pieces of pie with ice cream" he said smirking at her, that old sexy smirk that used to melt her…

-"Isn't that a good idea?" she said smiling at her, and then she added, "and why don't you join me, so we can catch up? I have lots of questions about this" she said signaling her surroundings

-"Sure" he said being the old monosyllabic Jess, going back to the kitchen to prepare himself and her order.


End file.
